A great ARPG with a ton of content and loads of soul

Dec 25, 2014 08:11 GMT  ·  By

Next up in our Softpedia Game of the Year 2014 awards is the runner-up of the Best PC Exclusive category, Neocore Games' The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing 2.

When The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing came out last it, it was a very pleasant surprise. Of course, it lacked the high production value of Diablo 3, but it was nonetheless fun, and it had a lot of fresh ideas all crammed in, making for a huge product and showing a lot of courage from an unknown studio.

One of the best things about it was the humor and ubiquitous pop culture references, but the whole steampunk angle didn't hurt either.

When I heard that Neocore was doing a sequel, I was really curious to see whether they would be able to strike gold a second time, and fortunately for them, they did.

The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing 2 improved on every area of the first game and also added a ton of new content, the kind of things that are usually left for post-launch DLC by most developers. Instead, Neocore delivered a game that can easily keep you playing for tens of hours, at a very affordable price.

While the game had some technical shortcomings at launch, it packed a lot of stuff, including a base management minigame, similar to World of Warcraft: Warlords of Draenor's garrisons, where you would send your troops on missions to get crafting materials and new loot.

There is just so much stuff to do

The crafting system itself had been greatly expanded, and probably the best thing about the entire thing was that it also had an endgame.

When Diablo 3 was released, I was very displeased with the fact that it didn't have anything to do once the campaign missions were done. Torchlight 2 and Path of Exile got it right, once the campaign is over, doing random maps is the best way to go.

That essentially enables you to quickly jump into the game from time to time and play for 30 minutes to a couple of hours, long after the initial draw of the game is gone.

The fact that the game also offered a huge arsenal of spells, complemented by numerous perks, tricks, auras and passives, enabling you to craft unique builds such as glass cannons with limited invulnerability and heals from when things got hairy, also prolonged the game's lifespan for me.

Neocore packed a wealth of content into the game in a very short time, and although at launch there was a distinct feeling of rushing through, as if there had not been enough time to polish everything, the immense creativity and ambition were the things that impressed me the most.

The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing might not be as polished and good looking as other games that came out this year, but it completely makes up for that with crazy fun gameplay, a lot of personality and humor, rewarding and diverse mechanics, and a very long shelf life, especially since it also comes with multiplayer.

If you want to learn more, you can check out our review of The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing 2.

The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing 2 (7 Images)

The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing 2
The skill tree is pretty deep... or tall... whateverI will grind you to bits, Grindermaton
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